Mosque disputes go beyond Ground Zero

The dispute over an Islamic community center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero in New York City may be just the tip of the minaret.

In Murfreesboro, Tenn., outside Nashville, resistance is building to a 52,000-square-foot Islamic Center and mosque, with protests and vandalism, NPR reports. Here’s one opponent’s quote:

This mosque that they’re trying to build, all it is a training center. In Islam, a mosque means we have conquered this country. And where are they? The center of Tennessee. They’re going to say: We have conquered Tennessee.

Opponents of an Islamic cultural center and mosque planned in lower Manhattan cheer a speaker during a demonstration Sunday in New York City. Activists both for and against the proposed Park51 project two blocks from Ground Zero rallied supporters near the proposed building site as the controversy continued. (Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images)

This isn’t the first time the controversy has flared in Tennessee– plans for a mosque in nearby Brentwood were shot down after a campaign to block rezoning.

Time reports this week on protests in the Southern California town of Temecula, near Camp Pendleton. The local Islamic center wants to build a mosque on land it owns near two churches. The project prompted a vocal protest by local conservative activists, who brought along dogs to offend Islamic sensibilities and carried signs like “No More Mosques in America.”

Not surprisingly, Fox News’ report on the same dispute makes the protesters seem more rational, citing concerns such as statements by one of the local Islamic center’s board members, Mosaad Rawash, that appeared to support Hamas and holy war (Rawash has been suspended).

Similar battles have taken place in Europe. In London, plans for a “mega-mosque” near the site of the 2012 Olympics were greeted by a 48,000-signature petition campaign (the plan was shelved after the sponsors failed to meet a planning application deadline.) In Switzerland, voters last year banned minarets, with supporters saying Islamic law was incompatible with Swiss democracy.

But the expansion of the controversy to this country is causing concern in Islamic circles that the clash of ideologies that led to France’s attempt to ban Islamic clothing is expanding to the historically tolerant U.S.